Labianca case: Don’t behave like ‘Konongo kaya’ – NPP MP tells Martin Amidu

Kwame Anyimadu-Antwi, MP, Asante-Akim Central, has indicated that Martin Amidu, the former Special Prosecutor, should be the last Ghanaian to speak about the modus operandi employed by the Office of the Special Prosecutor, OSP, in their quest to fight corruption.

According to him, the former Attorney General was given the opportunity to run the OSP but when he got to a point, he turned his back on the State and decided to go and sit on the fence. From the fence, he now wants to direct the affairs of the institution.

The Chairman of the Constitutional, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Committee of Parliament equated the behaviour of Amidu to the proverbial ‘Konongo kaya’ – where he will not execute a task, yet will not allow others to do it either.

“Stop behaving like the proverbial ‘Konongo kaya’. My constituency is at Konongo. I beg Martin Amidu, he should stop behaving like the kayaman from my hometown Konongo – what we call Konongo kaya,” Kwame Anyimadu-Antwi told Martin Amidu in a Joy FM interview on Friday, August 19.

The MP noted that “Ghanaians would be happier if he (Martin Amidu) would wean himself off OSP affairs. The whole nation gave you the authority to actually run this office, you got to a point that you turned your back against the State.

“Now you go and sit on the fence then you are now directing the institution that you know the right thing to do and that they are not doing the right thing. You are accusing this institution of doing wrong and that they have actually taken sides.

“The question is whether or not what he is proposing, he has also not taken a side against the institution or another person?” Anyimadu-Antwi quizzed.

Martin Amidu, a former Special Prosecutor, in his latest epistle has slammed a report issued by Kissi Agyebeng, current Special Prosecutor on the Labianca case.

Amidu believes that the Labianca report is hollow, without mandate and unconstitutional.

He explained that “the report seriously violates the statutory mandate of the OSP under the 1992 Constitution.”

He said the report is also inconsistent with and contravenes Act 959 and the 1992 Constitution.

“The OSP Labianca report does not disclose the commission of any corruption and corruption-related offences upon which the suspects or accused were cautioned or charged if they were indeed cautioned or charged,” he observed.

“Nonetheless a mere investigatory report which is an internal pre-trial documentary process under Section 3 of Act 959 and Regulations 5, 6, and 7 of L. I. 2374 dealing with preliminary inquiry, investigation, full investigation, and investigation panels has been unconstitutionally and unlawfully turned into a public report containing damning adverse findings of guilt in the court of public opinion against Ms. Eunice Jacqueline Buah Asomah-Hinneh, an elected Member of the Council of State and Board Member of the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority, the Deputy Commissioner for Customs, Mr. Joseph Adu Kyei, and the Commissioner for Customs, Colonel Kwadwo Damoah (Rtd.) who were each only invited as a witness to the OSP’s Labianca investigations,” Martin Amidu stressed.